


All That Was Me is Gone

by ab2fsycho



Series: Revolve [19]
Category: Layton Kyouju Series | Professor Layton Series
Genre: M/M, Panic Attacks, consider the bass dropped, oh dear me, one month since the last fic in the series, pray for mercy, shit's hitting the fan guys, switching personas
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-27
Updated: 2015-02-27
Packaged: 2018-03-15 10:48:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,605
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3444317
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ab2fsycho/pseuds/ab2fsycho
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Raymond isn't here, Desmond has just gotten himself somewhat back together again, and Layton is gone.</p>
            </blockquote>





	All That Was Me is Gone

“What do we do?” she asked, but she received no answer. The home was in shambles from a struggle that left much of the professor's things scattered across the floor. There was a small pool of blood in the kitchen. “Professor?” He should have known better. He should have known this would happen eventually. They had come. They had come, and it hadn't been him they'd found. They had found Layton, and . . ., “Professor, what do we do?”

It had been a month since that day out. Everything had been going so well. Desmond no longer had to bandage his shoulder, and he didn't feel a lance of agony so much as a series of pinpricks in the scar as he turned and shifted. For the first time in a long while, Desmond had felt some semblance of happiness. He hadn't felt divided, instead beginning to feel whole again. He'd remembered what it was like not to bury his feelings, and had actually started to laugh genuinely once more. The first time Layton had heard him truly laugh, he'd been taken aback at first. Then he'd smiled and leaned forward to kiss him. Later the professor would explain that it was a side of Desmond he'd never seen before, one that he hoped to see more of. If Raymond could have seen him . . . .

But Raymond wasn't here. He was still missing and all that was good had come grinding to a halt.

His mind was a fog. He couldn't remember everything that had happened that day. He remembered that he and Flora had gone out for errands. They'd wanted Layton to go with them that day, but he had elected to stay behind and finish up some neglected work. The errands were tedious. They'd stopped by the penitentiary for Flora to visit Clive (Desmond hadn't actually gone inside) and then proceeded with picking up the items they'd set out to find. Things got cloudy as they were heading back to their home, and now his head felt so heavy he couldn't focus. Flora kept asking him what they should do, but he kept staring at the small amount of blood in the kitchen. 

They had come for him. They had to have come for him.

But they now had Layton.

Layton had been . . . .

His fault. This was all his fault. He'd done this to him.

He wasn't aware of how much time had passed until Flora's voice stopped echoing in his head and there was another knock at the door. He flinched at the sound, only to have Flora apologize. Her voice was distorted, but he clearly understood the words that she'd called someone over. He knew who it was. He just couldn't get up off the floor. When had he wound up on the floor?

How long?

How long had he been sitting and staring?

Everything inside him started rattling when two large hands grabbed his lapels and pulled him to his feet. Without thinking, he swung and decked the man in the nose. There was a crack as he broke said nose, and blood poured from a nostril. The man dropped him and Desmond fell back against the counter.

The man, Don Paolo, growled, “Get your shit together, man!” The other eyed Desmond, wiping his nose as he glared. “You hit too hard for _just_ a professor.” His voice became clearer as Desmond stared blankly, blinking several times. Everything was so loud. Everything was so loud and fuzzy, but things were starting to clear up in his mind. He could feel the pain in his knuckles from how hard he'd punched the dinosaur. “It's time to come clean, mate. What do you know?”

It was a valid question. As his head stopped spinning long enough to acknowledge this, he realized it was no longer the time for keeping secrets. Clearing his throat, he closed his eyes and tried to steady himself. “Yes.” He rubbed his forehead. “Yes it is.”

(:)

“Let me get this straight,” Flora sighed as Paul stopped Desmond for at least the fifth time as he tried to explain everything, “you're . . . you're Jean Descole?”

Desmond nodded. She could see the anxiety clearly threatening to boil over in his gaze. She felt her own growing more and more. She'd been kidnapped in the past. She knew what it was like to have control over her own circumstances ripped from her hands. She had never imagined a situation in which the professor would be the one in need of rescuing though. The thought itself was surreal, and it seemed that Desmond was just as terrified as she was if not more. Unlike her and Paul, he knew the organization they were dealing with intimately. Well, at least half of it. “I have tried to keep a low profile for a good three years.” Desmond's voice was shaky, hands gripping one another in a desperate attempt to keep still. If his twitching leg was any indication, he was finding it difficult enough to keep from bolting for the door. That would get them nowhere as far as Flora could tell.

“No offense, Sycamore, but you are the last person I would have expected to be that . . . that man.” She didn't know what Paul was going to call Descole, but she had an inkling it wouldn't have been nice.

“That was the point of the disguise and the persona. Just who do you know would create a character without the intention of separating certain events from himself?” Flora knew from his voice and expression there was more to that statement. She'd seen the war within him herself. Descole was more than a character. “I kept up the appearance for one reason: to annihilate the remainder of Targent. The became harder. They went dark for a while. I ran into some . . . detectives and we came to an accord.” He glared down at the table, sighing loudly. “They should have arrested me, but it seemed we had a common interest. Many members of Targent were involved in the kidnapping and forced work of the scientists during the Future London incident. A large chunk of them became known as the Family—”

“I remember them,” Flora piped up. The two men looked at her for a moment and she apologized for her outburst almost immediately.

“It's alright,” Desmond assured. “I just . . . forget that Layton was involved in that calamity.”

“That's probably why he was kidnapped,” Paul observed.

Desmond shook his head. “I'm not sure.” There was a significant pause before he continued with, “When I was injured, I was looking for information on the whereabouts of their new headquarters. I came here at my butler's behest. I . . . have not heard from him since.” And that was visibly killing him thinking about it. Professor Sycamore broke slightly, resting his head in his palms as he muttered, “This is all my doing . . . I shouldn't have come back at all.” Flora wanted to reach for him, but he looked like he would just jerk away from her touch if she did.

“Did you know about this?” Paul asked Flora. She shook her head. “Did the professor?” Both she and Desmond shook their heads this time. “Who could have known you were Descole?”

Desmond's brow furrowed as he stared down at the stable. She could see his lips moving, muttering . . . names. He was muttering names. “No one. None of Targent ever—”

“No one figured it out even when you were wounded?” Desmond paused for a moment, then shook his head slowly. “It's entirely possible that he was taken simply because of his involvement in Future London.”

“But we were involved too,” Flora stated.

Paul shook his head. “Not like him. And,” he held up a finger, “since when have you known me to get caught by cops.”

“Yes, you're so slippery,” she grumbled as her fingers started to twitch. “What do we do? Should I call Chelmey?”

“The cops won't do anything for another twenty-four hours, and Layton could be dead by—,” Desmond covered his mouth and squeezed his eyes shut. Scooting the chair back, he excused himself quietly and proceeded toward the bathroom. Flora didn't miss that his voice had dropped about an octave. Before he was completely out of her sight, she glimpsed his eyes flashing red. 

Paul was about to get up and pursue him, possibly bring him back to the table to discuss what to do next. She touched his arm, catching his attention and shaking her head. “He needs to work through something first.”

Paul nodded, like he knew what she meant. After a moment of silence, Paul sighed and asked, “We need to save the professor for once, don't we?” She nodded, and was rewarded with a dramatic eyeroll. “I'm doing this for you, I hope you realize.”

“I do. Thank you.”

“If I'd known you were in the house with that . . . lunatic—”

“He's no worse than you or Clive. And you haven't seen the way he looks at the professor.”

“That doesn't help his case,” he growled. He turned an inquisitive look upon Flora. “Do you know half of what he's done?”

She did. But she didn't care. “I know him. I know he has reasons. Just like you and Clive. And,” oh no, the anxiety, “I just,” she couldn't let it get to her now. Closing her eyes and swallowing her fear, she murmured, “I just need my professor back, and he,” she gestured to the bathroom, “is probably the only person who can help us get him back.”

Paul paused for a long time, rubbing his face with both hands before leaning on his elbows with fingers laced together. “We need a plan.”

“And more information.”

Paul's gaze on her narrowed. “I'm not just dead sure you should participate in this.”

Her fear made her snap and she slammed her fist on the table, gritting her teeth against tears before snarling, “Don't you leave me behind too!”

Taken aback by her outburst, Paul quickly straightened up and patted her shoulder gently. “We won't. Alright? That would be foolish.” He sighed, eyes widening as he uttered, “With our luck they'd come back for you.”

Something clicked in her mind as she wiped at her eyes, sniffling a little at the thick fog that threatened to ride up from her chest to her mind. Before she lost her nerve to state her idea, she said, “We need to talk to Clive again.” Paul gave her a quizzical look, encouraging her to explain. Gathering her last few nerves together, she declared, “Who knows the Family better than him? Plus, there's got to be a few Targent members behind bars we can squeeze information from.”

Paul stared at her for a long time, then actually shook his head and chuckled. “How I wish I'd had you as an apprentice.”

(:)

Des had dropped his glasses in the sink and glared at his reflection. Chest heaving and brow furrowed, he could see his pupils disappearing even without the glasses. He felt his fists starting to ball against the bathroom counter and all he wanted to do was punch the mirror. He closed his eyes, taking deep breaths and begging himself to calm down and think. Think of a plan, think of what to do, think of how to get Layton back, but don't directly think of Layton or else his temper would ignite.

It was too late for that. Grabbing handfuls of his hair, he was seconds away from screaming at his reflection. There were benefits to having a physical mask to direct his fury at, but how he longed to be able to maintain the cool facade Layton was always so keen to uphold. Then at least he wouldn't have to excuse himself to confront a side of himself few to none took pleasure in seeing.

Falling back against the wall, he slid to the floor and proceeded to snarl at his attempts to calm down. He had to be calm. He had to think. He had to save Layton. He couldn't lose him. He couldn't lose another . . . .

He kicked the base of the sink in front of him, growling through gritted teeth as a hand flew instinctively to his left side in search of his sword. He needed to fight, he needed to find Layton, he needed to . . . he needed to breathe.

Des gasped, trying to alleviate the pressure on his chest and in his head. He pulled in long breaths of air, ignoring proper deep breathing exercises in favor of just filling his lungs as quickly as possible. Like a fish pulled from its watery home, he gaped and gasped for the proper amount of air all the while his chest continued to ache from the rage and the fear that threatened to undo him again. Closing his eyes, he tried to remember that he wasn't really alone in this. He wasn't. But he couldn't ask. He couldn't ask for help. He'd done this. He didn't care who said otherwise, he had done this. This never would have happened if he'd never come back, never gotten injured. If he'd just done his goddamn job—

He was lying on the floor by the time he heard the knocks on the door. His side itched where the wound was, but he didn't move. He just listened as Don Paolo's gruff voice reached him through the door, “We need to go back to prison.”

That was a hell of a way to greet someone having a panic attack. Gulping, he was about to refuse the notion when Flora backed up the statement with, “Clive can tell us more about the Family.” Des shook his head. He wasn't ready to set foot in that place. He had sworn never to do so, as there was one person in particular he would _never_ be ready to see again. It struck him perhaps that person was the only one who might have some semblance of reliable information on the whereabouts of the new headquarters. But to ask . . . he would blow his cover. One thought of Layton was all it would take for him to either push himself back up off the ground or stay crippled for the duration of the time. It was actually Flora's voice that brought him around to the realization of what needed to be done. “Please. You know what to ask. Come with us.”

“Preferably before visiting hours end.” He could hear the smack of Flora's punch to the man's arm.

Des closed his eyes once more. Breathing in deeply, he should have been more prepared for the convergence of his identities. He should have known he would have to choose one day. 

Then Des recalled that long ago he'd decided Professor Hershel Layton was worth risking his identity. His chest clenched at the memories, at the fear for the man's life. He knew what he had to do. He knew what he needed to do.

He still wished for a calmer, cooler facade. But Layton was almost incapable of casting aside that facade, and when he did things just got confusing. Des could take the mask off and put it on whenever he so desired. He could discern when he needed which persona for whatever purpose. He just needed to remember how.

(:)

Paul and Flora were seconds away from leaving the older professor be when the door opened and Desmond emerged. Pushing his red glasses further up on his nose, he blinked twice and his eyes were no longer flashing quite as brightly. Still crestfallen and somewhat disheveled, he gave them a stern look and declared, “Lead the way.”


End file.
